


Boomer Karen

by strawberrysunflower



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Anxiety, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-03
Updated: 2021-03-03
Packaged: 2021-03-16 12:42:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29825097
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strawberrysunflower/pseuds/strawberrysunflower
Summary: “What do theymean, I look like a Boomer Karen?”Phil reflects on getting older.
Relationships: Dan Howell/Phil Lester
Comments: 50
Kudos: 135





	Boomer Karen

**Author's Note:**

> Whoops this was supposed to be written for last week when it was actually relevant - curse dnp for posting content so regularly now my slow ass can’t keep up *shakes fist at the sky*
> 
> Anyway, we love our Number 1 Dad, even if he does have slight boomer energy sometimes. Enjoy, and as always lemme know what you think!
> 
> tw: brief mentions of weight gain and lockdown fatigue

It’d been funny at first. Sort of. 

There are some benefits of getting older, Phil has to admit, even if they feel minimal between the constant back pain and the three day long hangovers he suffers through these days. Not feeling the need to over-analyze his own face anymore is one of the perks. He knows the muscle-clenching cringe of seeing himself in certain photos only too well, knows what it’s like to stare at a selfie for so long that all he can see are fringe gaps and nose bumps and that weird pouty thing he does with his lips sometimes without realising. 

Nowadays, it just doesn’t bother him as much. There are bigger things in life he has to worry about: the ever-increasing delay in being able to move into their new place for one, the ongoing worldwide pandemic for another. He just doesn’t have space in his head to panic about crows feet and pore sizes anymore.

So, Phil posts a selfie he took during Dan’s photoshoot day in the park, closes up Instagram, throws his phone onto the sofa and seeks out Dan to help him plate up the Thai red curry they ordered tonight. 

He only checks the comments when they’re lying in bed, because he’s a human being who appreciates a bit of validation sometimes. There’s a running theme with some of them: _‘this has serious dad energy’_ is a popular choice, as is _‘imagine if amazingphil was your rich gay uncle’_ which makes him laugh under his breath. 

And then there it is. The one comment that makes him sit up in bed and grab his glasses off the side table so that he can see it clearly.

 _‘No offence but you look like such a boomer karen in this pic_ 🙄’

Phil frowns, lets out a slight, confused laugh. Scrolls up to the picture again. _Peers_ at it, like he’s expecting a bob haircut with questionable highlights to morph into view. 

“Dan,” Phil says, whizzing down to find the comment again. He only gets a distracted hum in reply; Dan is too busy updating his house in Animal Crossing to pay attention to him. Phil rolls his eyes and jostles his elbow into Dan’s ribs.

“ _Dan_.”

“What?” Dan grunts, wriggling away from his pointy joints, still transfixed by his Switch.

“Someone said I look like a ‘Boomer Karen’ in my selfie.”

This catches his attention. Dan lets out a big bark of surprised laughter, whips his head round to blink at Phil with nothing short of glee in his eyes. “Seriously? Let’s see.”

Phil passes his phone over so that Dan can read the comment, wincing as Dan’s high-pitched hyena laugh cuts through the room again.

“What do they _mean_ , I look like a Boomer Karen? I don’t get it,” he says, and he suddenly feels pouty and petulant, like the outsider of an in-joke he doesn’t understand. “I thought it was a nice picture.”

“Oh, Phil, don’t, you’re breaking my heart here,” Dan coos, his voice still wobbling with unchecked humour. He leans against Phil’s shoulder and scrolls up to the photo so that they can both appraise it like they’re sodding art critics. “It _is_ nice, but it does have certain… boomer-y elements to it.”

“Like _what?”_

“Well, like… you know how old people on Facebook post that one specific selfie, and another old person will comment on it like ‘looking good, Janice, hope the grandkids are doing well’? It looks like that.”

Phil snorts and yanks the phone back out of his hands to lock it off, fed up of seeing his own stupid face. “Great. Thanks.” 

“Don’t get stroppy, you’re making me feel like a dick now,” Dan whines, nuzzling closer against him and wrapping his arms around his waist. It’s nice, for a moment. Until Dan lets out an involuntary hiccup of laughter which devolves into hysterical giggles again. He wipes at his eyes, grinning, and says, “Sorry, bub, I’m sorry. It’s not even that funny.”

“I guess it is a bit,” Phil smirks, giving Dan’s curls a playful tug. “D’you think I’d suit it?”

“Suit what?”

“The Karen hairstyle.”

This just sets Dan off again, wheezing until he’s breathlessly waving his hand about in silent surrender. And really, what choice does Phil have but to laugh with him? It’s not like he isn’t used to ridiculous jokes at his own expense. It’s fine. Funny, even. Sort of.

It’s not quite as funny in the morning.

Phil wakes up with a pounding headache over his left eye, which is always a sure-fire way to plunge him into a bad mood before the day’s even begun. He hauls himself out of bed, desperate for a wee, and winces at the pinching pain between his shoulder blades, an ongoing niggle from when he tweaked it a month ago moving furniture around during a stupid game of the Floor is Lava, something a confirmed 'Boomer Karen' probably shouldn't be playing. When he gets to the bathroom, he frowns at his reflection in the mirror; it’s blurry without his glasses, but he can still make out the obvious. 

He’s getting older. He’s getting _old_. And that’s concept, today, is terrifying.

When Phil slouches back to the bedroom, the thought of getting into bed again makes his breath catch and his chest go all achy, the mere concept of wasting more time curled up under the duvet filling him with existential dread. So instead he leaves Dan to sleep, draped out across the covers like a big, snuffly brown bear, and instead snatches up his glasses from the side table and hunts around for something to wear other than his boxers.

And he stops. Because suddenly everything looks _wrong_ hanging up in his wardrobe. There are bright, daft jumpers, and gaudily patterned button-ups, and t-shirts stamped with nerdy references, and endless amounts of black jeans, some of which might be genuine relics from his emo days. It’s like he’s cosplaying as a quirky college student, rather than a man well into his thirties with his own property, a financial advisor, and a bottle full of once-a-day vitamins in his bathroom cabinet.

Phil can feel Dan’s eyes on him now, can hear the way he’s moving about in bed, as if he’s hopeful to see a show. But Phil just doesn’t have the energy for it today. Instead he pulls on a pair of plain sweatpants and a black hoodie that he’s fairly certain belongs to Dan, but it’s hung up in his wardrobe so right now that makes it his. 

He leaves for the kitchen without even turning around. If there’s one thing that can always make him feel better, it’s his own body weight in toast.

He's waiting for the toaster to pop up, hands braced against the counter, trying to crack the annoying ache in the centre of his spine, when his left leg gets taken out from under him by a foot to the back of his knee. 

“You're up early,” Dan comments, voice thick with sleep, as he hauls himself up on the nearby worktop and pinches Phil's coffee for a sip. Phil had grabbed his 'Daddy' mug in his half-awake daze. Go figure.

“Yeah, I just… didn't feel like going back to sleep.”

“Not like you. Usually I have to yeet you out of bed on a weekend.”

Phil lips pull up into a strained smile. The pounding ache behind his eyes gets worse. Dan seems to notice something’s amiss because he falls silent for a moment, bare legs swinging so that the soles of his feet thump against the counter. Phil is just about to tell him to quit it, when Dan reaches over and tugs on the hoodie.

“You look like you’re going to a funeral.”

“Hm?” Phil mumbles, distracted, then tears his gaze away from the toaster to look down at his all-black outfit. “Oh. Yeah. I dunno, I- Just-.”

The words won’t form. It gets like this sometimes - when the uncomfortable itchy feeling builds within him, and he can’t sit still or construct proper sentences, can’t even get the thoughts in his brain to line up right. Dan’s quick on the uptake, thankfully. 

“Hey, relax, I’m kidding. It’s only what I wear on a daily basis,” he says with a small, unsure laugh, and Phil looks at him properly rather than acknowledging him as a formless blob out of the corner of his eye. He’s leaning back on his hands now, legs spread apart, and if this were any normal day Phil would have slotted himself into the space between his knees and leant in to nibble at his earlobe or something else daft.

Now, he just… doesn’t have the energy. The toast pops up, and as Phil blinks at it, the gnawing in his stomach that he attributed to hunger feels more like nausea. 

“D’you want this?”

Dan frowns, cocks his head to one side. “Why, what are you going to have?”

“I’m not really hungry.” 

“Oh. Well. I guess so, if it’s going to waste.”

Phil grabs a plate and the jar of Sun-Pat, slathers the crunchy peanut butter on thick like he knows Dan likes it. He passes the plate over when he’s done, but Dan catches onto his wrist before he can move away again. He tugs Phil forward, until he’s close enough to press a kiss to his forehead beneath his floppy morning hair. 

“I’m getting psychic messages from your mother. She’s saying…” Dan pauses, looks off into the distance with one hand raised, puts on a silly Northern accent when he’s done with his charade. “Make sure you eat something today, pet.” 

Phil smirks and squeezes his knee. “I will. I’m just going for a shower.”

Normally, Phil is an in-and-out kind of guy; Dan’s the one that takes upwards of twenty minutes in the shower, singing show tunes or arguing out loud with himself, applying lotions and scrubs and body milks until he comes out smelling like a Lush shop, and racking up a fortune in water bills.

“It’s called _self-care_ , Phil,” Dan had sneered after Phil called him out on it. “You should try it sometime. A shower can be more than just washing your hair and your balls in sixty seconds flat.”

So, under the spray of the hot water, Phil uses it as a chance to ground himself. He closes his eyes and does the breathing exercises Dan taught him. Inhales the smell of his vanilla body wash. Rubs away some of the pain where his shoulders meet his neck. By the time he steps out of the shower and wraps one of their fluffiest towels around his waist, he's beginning to feel a little more human again. 

There's a fresh mug of coffee waiting for him on the chest of drawers when he gets back, along with two chocolate digestives. Upstairs Dan is playing his piano, a sound that's simultaneously soothing and irritating at the moment - he's teaching himself to sight read, which is a slow, repetitive process that involves a lot of pausing, fumbled notes and angry swearing. At least it's better than empty silence. 

It’s not until Phil has replaced the towel with a fresh pair of boxers and started drying his hair in the mirror that the weird, twisty, staticky feeling starts building up in his stomach again, tightening across his rib cage. 

He doesn’t _look_ like himself. It’s as if today everything has shifted, and suddenly he’s able to see himself the way everyone else must do, away from the biases of his own mind. When he widens his eyes, wrinkles deepen across his forehead, and when he frowns they form grooves between his eyebrows. He had his hair cut recently, and all it served to do is emphasise the stubborn patch of silvery-grey on one side of his head that seems to defy hair dye completely. Some of his roots come back grey too these days; Dan likes to point them out, tugging at them when they’re lying face to face in bed, teasing him about how he’ll be a silver fox by thirty-four at this rate.

It’s all familiar and uncomfortably alien at the same time. He still only feels about twenty in his head most days, so today it’s especially jarring to see… well. A fully-fledged grown-up staring back at him. Of course, all of this only highlights the frustrating irony of the two painful teenage spots forming near his nose - _maskne_ , as people have been calling it, but it’s still a twist of the knife knowing that getting older doesn’t make him impervious to break-outs. 

Phil sighs, nibbles at the hangnail on his thumb as his eyes travel downwards in the mirror, taking in the length of his body. He’s not as weird and gangly as he was when he was younger, at least. There’s muscle now in his arms and legs, left over from all the workouts they did in preparation for the second tour, although the lack of leaving the house and increase in takeaways this year has softened his hips and stomach a bit. Phil can’t say he really cares; he would rather the convenience of someone bringing fresh pasta and tubs of Ben & Jerry’s to his front door, plus Dan seems to like it judging by the way he can’t keep his hands off his ass and thighs. Still. Those days of eating stacks of pancakes as big as his head and not seeing the repercussions on his body are long gone.

“What are you doing?”

Phil lets out a terrified squeak, whips round so violently that he almost smacks into the bedpost. Dan’s standing there, one shoulder leaning against the door frame; Phil completely missed the lack of music, too lost in his own spiralling self-critique. 

“Horrible boy,” Phil mutters, rubbing at the crick in his neck. “I’m not doing anything.”

“No? Just enjoying my favourite view without me?” Dan grins, moving forward to flop out across the width of the bed on his stomach, kicking his legs up and fluttering his lashes. Phil snorts and rolls his eyes, then roots around in the chest of drawers for a new t-shirt and a pair of lounge shorts.

“ _Definitely_ not.”

“What’s up with you today?”

Phil shrugs, prickling at Dan’s tone, that mixture of concern and annoyance that crops up when Phil can’t use his words properly. “Nothing. Just- I dunno. Off day.”

“Your turn to hit the 'rona slump, huh?” Dan sighs, then pats the space on the bed next to him. Phil drops down beside him, wriggling around until he’s lying on his back, blinking up at the ceiling, shoulder pressing into Dan’s own.

“Wanna talk about it?” Dan asks softly, and Phil feels familiar fingers play with his hair as if they’re moving of their own accord. He’s quiet for a moment, watching a fluttering cobweb attached to the corner of the room.

“Do I look old?”

Dan laughs, because of course he does. “You're not still bugged out by that Boomer Karen thing, are you?”

“No!” Phil blurts out, then winces, turns his head to look Dan properly in the eye. “Sort of. Is that really dumb?”

Dan just chuckles and shakes his head. He wriggles around a bit until he’s lying on his back too, their legs flopped out over the edge of the bed, Dan’s bare foot stroking against Phil’s ankle. “What's the sliding spectrum of 'looking old'? I mean, do you look older than when I first met you? Yes, obviously, that's how time works. Do you look as old as, I don't know, Prince Phillip? I don't think _anyone_ looks that old…”

“It's just got me in a bit of a weird spin today. Getting older,” Phil explains, worrying the hem of his shirt between his fingers. “Like… am I really still going to be making AmazingPhil videos when I'm forty? Or _fifty?”_

“I don't see why not. If that's what you want to do.”

It _is_ what he wants to do, deep in his heart; Phil would happily keep making YouTube videos until he’s senile and can’t remember the password to his account anymore. But there’s something about the image of himself on a video thumbnail, middle aged and grey haired and undoubtedly in the same bloody black skinny jeans, that makes his heart thump painfully fast in his chest.

“I'm terrified of getting old. Like, if I start thinking too much about the next ten or twenty years, I start shaking. Look!”

Phil holds up one of his hands, and it is actually trembling, more so than usual. Dan tuts fondly and envelopes his hand in both of his big, warm ones, then tugs it down until they rest against his stomach. Dan lets out a thoughtful hum.

“You could Dorian Gray yourself, I guess. Keep a painting of an old, wizened Phil in the attic of our new place, and then you can stay youthful and sexy forever.”

“But it’s not just me, is it? You’re getting old-”

“Uh, bitch, I am still in my twenties, thank you.”

“- and Martyn is getting old, and my _parents_ , ugh. I’m almost scared to see them again. Like, I’m terrified it’ll be so long until I get chance to go and visit when all this is over that they’ll have aged into crumbly old pensioners.”

Dan snorts and gestures with his hands wildly, Phil’s own still clasped in one.

“That’s life, bud. Why do you think I spend so long lying face down on the floor? We’re born, we grow old, we have a few nice memories in amongst all the shit, and then we die.”

“Wow, amazing, thank you. And you’re supposed to be writing a book about mental health advice?”

Dan lets go of his hand to pinch at his side, and Phil grins at this, squirms away half-heartedly. Then he sighs and tilts his head until he can feel it rest against Dan’s. “It’s scary. Like… I love where we’re at right now, don’t get me wrong, and I'm excited for our future. But at the same time I don't want things to change anymore. Sometimes I just miss being twenty-two and a bit stupid.”

“As opposed to thirty-three and a lot stupid?” 

Dan lets out a wheezy laugh when Phil slaps his hand down against stomach, curling in on himself. But then his voice softens. He trails his fingers along the underside of Phil’s wrist in a way that seems totally absent-minded, but it’s the only thing that’s actually made the tightness in Phil’s chest ease up all day. “I get it. Plus this year isn’t helping. It feels like we’re being robbed of the time we have left.”

“Exactly!” Phil exclaims, then sighs, pushing his fingers up under his glasses to rub tiredly at his left eye where the headache is still throbbing. “I’m sorry. It’s just… all getting to me a bit today.”

“It happens. But I don’t think ‘getting older’ means you ever have to stop being _you_. You can still be weird and spontaneous and stupid no matter your age, but when you’re older you get the added benefits of wisdom and less shits to give.” 

“I guess so.” 

They lapse into comfortable, thoughtful silence for a few moments. And really, Phil might tease that Dan gives the world’s worst advice sometimes, but that’s exactly what he needed to hear. It’s ridiculous to think that Phil can somehow stop the inevitable march of time with sheer anxiety and willpower alone. He’ll never get to be twelve again, or eighteen, or twenty-two. But that’s okay. Because he’ll get to be thirty-four, and forty, and fifty, and he’ll still be the same awkward nerd he’s always been, even with grey hair and back problems. Phil smiles properly for the first time all day, then faces Dan, one eyebrow raised.

“So you _do_ think I look old?”

“I do. I think you’re aging like a fine wine, Philly,” Dan grins, turning onto his side so that he can curl up around him, koala-style. Suddenly he gasps and grips onto Phil’s arm like he’s been shocked. “I’ve just had the biggest galaxy brain idea.”

“What?”

“We nip down to Tesco. We buy booze. We buy snacks. We sit out on the balcony in the sun all day and we get, wait for it…” he waves one hand across the air with particularly gay flourish, “Day drunk. Because we’re grown-ups and we fucking can.” 

Phil grins and loops his arms around Dan’s waist into a proper hug, able to stand it now that the buzzing in his brain has receded back into a faint whispering lull. He supposes he can cope with the agony of getting old, so long as they can keep doing it together.

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi on tumblr! [strawberrysunflower](https://strawberry-sunflower.tumblr.com/)


End file.
